Nirvana – Bleach
I just found out about this album only a few years ago. I had no idea that there was a preceding album from Nirvana - Nevermind. When I first listened to this album it was easily marked for me as a 90s alternative rock album. The sounds are perfectly marked for it. I purchased this album last year on vinyl. I was disappointed to learn that there was a limited white vinyl version of this. Since I already purchased it I chalked it up to my lack of knowledge about the band. The limited version was colored white because of the name of the album. This is the album where the song About A Girl originally comes from. Most people who know the song only know the acoustic version that was recorded for the MTV Unplugged session. The song is just as good in the studio from my opinion. The first single from the album is called Love Buzz. It has a cool Indian music style riff in the guitar and bass. It is similar to The Offspring song called Come Out And Play but this song was done in 89 as opposed to The Offspring doing it better in 94. Obviously The Offspring took a page from Nirvana and put a fresh spin on it. It worked for them but not so much for Nirvana at the time. The third single off this album is the first track from the album. It features Cobains’ vocals matching his guitar tones for the most part. There is also a deep bass sound that I really enjoy. This album is a classic foreshadowing of what was to come in the 90s for the grunge sound. I am glad that I own a copy of the album but in no way will it ever be in heavy rotation in my current listening habits. I have had so much 90s grung/alternative that there isn’t much that I will go back to. At times I will go back to Pearl Jam but it will usually be Radiohead before anything else.
Catherine Wheel – Ferment
This is an important album in the shoegazer scene. This album was released in the early 90s. I remember hearing the last single, Black Metallic, that was released from this album on the radio. I don’t remember ever seeing a video for the song. This could be just due to my family not having cable at the time. We did always have radio time as a family though on the way up to the camp grounds every weekend for an hour and back. My father let us listen to pop radio, KDWB 101.3 at the time. It was especially cool on the trip home on Sundays. This was when the station would play the top 100. We would usually catch the last 25 and would then be able to hear the number one track for the week. I always thought this was exciting. It never occurred to me that the songs did not change as much but I did get to hear new music regularly. This is apart of where my love for music comes from I guess. I was always exposed to new and different music. This song Black Metallic was a new kind of music to me. it did not really fit in with the other pop music that I was hearing at the time. Nirvana had just burst on the scene and the grunge sound was new and hot. Grunge sort of washed over the whole idea of shoegazer. Grunge was a more forceful sound. It is really too bad because shoegazer sounds are much more rich and intense than grunge will ever be. Luckily, the shoegazer sound is coming back. I really hope that it will be better received this time.
Arcade Fire – Funeral
Aparently all the critics love this album. Although it is an important album in the mid 00s indie music scene, I don’t think that it is that great of an album. I much prefer their second album Neon Bible than this album. The only song that really saves this album is Neighborhood #3 (Power Out). This song is preclusive to what the group would show on their second album. This song has a great beat that drives through the whole song. The rest of the album is just OK for me. I am glad that I own a copy of it, on vinyl no less, but this is also an album that will never see heavy rotation in my listening to music. There were quite a few songs off this album that were released as singles. Neighborkood #1 (Tunnels), Neightorhood #2 (Laika), I already mentioned Neightorhood #3 (Power Out), Rebellion (Lies) and Wake Up. The last of which was used in the commercials for the movie Where The Wild Things Are. This is also a great emotional song but is easily forgotten.
LCD Soundsystem – This Is Happening
I know I did a short blurb review of the first listen from NPR but I now own the album. I have listened to the album quite a bit since I got it on CD. Actually I liked the album so much that I also bought it on vinyl. I never thought about getting it on vinyl until I listened to most of the album at Jerry Raskin’s Needle Doctor. The store had just moved from its original location in Dinky Town, part of the UofM, to the new location off 100 and Excelsior. It is still a small store but it is bigger than where they were. I talked with Jerry about the old store and the new store, what he liked and disliked about each one. He even gave me a tour of the new store. He showed me every nook and cranny of the new site. I felt very special that he was willing to show me all of this. After this I saw that one of the employees’ had brought in this album. I asked if I could listen to some of it. He said sure and proceeded to set it up on the demo stereo that they had set up. As I said before I knew this album pretty well by now. I sat down in the metal folding chair to have a listen on this stereo that I had never heard before. The speakers were new and not fully broken in but had a nice warm sound. The turntable that was being used is a lot nicer than mine and in general the stereo is probably a lot more expensive than mine too. As soon as the music started playing I fell in love with vinyl all over again. I don’t want any of this equipment mind you. I have zero interest in any of the equipment being used, even though it is partially the equipment that colors the sound. This record sounded amazing. I had to have it. The reason that I originally bought this album on CD was because the original release of this album on vinyl was going to cost me $45 for a single vinyl. I thought that was a very steep price for an album that I could have gotten for 10 bucks on CD. This is why I got it on CD. So, after I listened to the album on vinyl I did some research. I found out that the album had already been repressed to a double vinyl version and now was priced at 15 bucks. I couldn’t turn that down. It was wrapped and put in the Christmas pile. Since Christmas I have listened to it a few times on the turntable. I can’t not love this album. There are only a couple stinkers on this album. The first single, Drunk Girls, is one of them. The artist was even quoted as saying the song is dumb. That should say a lot about the song. The other song that I did not enjoy was Somebody’s Calling Me. The song would have been a pretty good song if he had left out the annoying tone that flows through out the song. There are also some really great songs on this album too. My absolute favorite song on this album is called All I Want. This is mainly because of the soaring guitar riff that flows through this song. It reminds me of something that would have come out of the mid 80s pop rock scene. The rest of the album is really on par with itself. It all kind of floats on a happy and excitement building cloud that really makes you feel good while listening to it. I would recommend this on any format to everyone. I think that there is something for everybody on this album for sure.
Nine Inch Nails – Pretty Hate Machine
This is a great album. The sounds that are used are very sharp electronic sounds though. So if you are not into harsh sounds even if they are musical in nature this album may not be for you. My first introduction to Nine Inch Nails was with the following full length called The Downward Spiral (TDS). As with many bands that I find and like, I did some research and found that this was the first release from the “group”. I can’t remember when I purchased it but it was defiantly after 1994. This was the year TDS was released. When I did finally get Pretty Hate Machine (PHM) I found that I liked the simple yet complex sounds that he, Trent Rezner, used in the music. There was something new and different about the hard edged sounds that he chose to use. As a matter of fact I listened to the music so much that I found I was memorizing the lyrics to half of the tracks on the album. It is not very often that this happens as I pick up music so often and don’t listen to much of it so often that I start learning the lyrics. It really needs to speak to me in order to do this. I listened to this album recently and found that I still have those songs lyrics memorized and it was fun to sing along with those songs too. This album was recently re-mastered. I have an interest in listening to the re-master but am not yet willing to shell out 10 bucks for an album that I already own.
That is all for now...
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